


and you write to me of love

by treescape



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Declarations Of Love, Epistolary, Fluff, Getting Together, Languages, Letters, M/M, Qui-Gon Jinn Lives, pure fluff, there is no excuse for this much fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-02 22:35:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24234409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/treescape/pseuds/treescape
Summary: Sometimes, when a message from Qui-Gon comes through on his personal comm, Obi-Wan will wait for hours before he carefully reads it line by line. He likes to take his time, with Qui-Gon’s words; there is something both painful and sweet to knowing that a piece of him waits for Obi-Wan to unravel at will.
Relationships: Qui-Gon Jinn/Obi-Wan Kenobi
Comments: 38
Kudos: 129
Collections: Qui-Gon/Obi-Wan May the Fourth be With You Prompt Meme





	and you write to me of love

**Author's Note:**

> From this beautiful prompt by [acatbyanyothername](%E2%80%9D): “Obi Wan and Qui Gon exchange letters after Naboo and sometimes writes in the language of his home planet, it’s always some variations on a love declarations, and so Obi Wan resolves to learn the language to understand what Qui Gon is trying to say to him [any rating but shippy].”
> 
> Many thanks to [Loopie_Lupie](%E2%80%9D) and [sanerontheinside](%E2%80%9D) for taking a look at this!

_Obi-Wan,_

_Yes, I agree that Irella Cata has posed some very interesting questions. Her philosophical treatise on mind and matter is near to exquisite. I wonder if you have read Myyse Aiden’s correspondence with her; it was published some months ago. They draw out the best in one another, I think._

_Training continues to go well, and I thank you for always asking. It does me good to hear your thoughts. Your suggestions are always welcome—and, I might add, always useful. Anakin is a quick learner, and sometimes I feel that I will never keep up._

_I apologize for my brevity; Anakin and I ship out this morning for a very brief mission to Dolara._

_Liä na ma¨ræ,  
Qui-Gon_

__

__

\---

Sometimes, when a message from Qui-Gon comes through on his personal comm, Obi-Wan will wait for hours before he carefully reads it line by line. He likes to take his time, with Qui-Gon’s words; there is something both painful and sweet to knowing that a piece of him waits for Obi-Wan to unravel at will.

In the years since Obi-Wan’s Knighting, they have written back and forth with a frequency that speaks of warmth and ease rather than urgency. Between his own unrelenting parade of missions and Qui-Gon’s many duties, Obi-Wan doesn’t get to see his former Master often, but that doesn’t mean they’ve grown distant. Their correspondence is one of the few constants in Obi-Wan’s life these days, a series of meandering conversations about politics and literature interspersed with the details of daily life.

In some ways, it might have been more efficient to record holograms. But for all that Qui-Gon’s voice was once the anchor of his days, there are benefits to written communication as well. It has made Obi-Wan weigh each word, his own _and_ Qui-Gon’s, in a way that speech is not always best suited for.

It has led to a fuller understanding of his own self, giving shape to the half-formed desires that once haunted his thoughts and dreams. It doesn’t change the fact that Qui-Gon can hardly want more from him than friendship, but Obi-Wan has always been a firm believer that all knowledge is worth having.

Even if, in this case, that knowledge is that he is hopelessly, impossibly in love with Qui-Gon Jinn.

\---

_Obi-Wan,_

_Dolara was uneventful, as I expected it to be. Anakin was disappointed, and I am sure he will tell you so at length when he has the chance. The Dolara have little interest in adventure and spacecraft and more appreciation for the meditative arts. Truly, the mountains there are beautiful. I think you would have enjoyed watching the sun crest their peaks._

_I could wish that Parmai will be as restful a mission for you, but I have heard the situation there is nearing critical. There is little wonder why they have chosen to send you in._

_I enclose here a copy of Cata and Aiden’s correspondence. I have taken the liberty of highlighting some of the passages that interest me most. I hope you will let me know your thoughts._

_T¨arî liäña,  
Qui-Gon_

\---

There are a great many things Obi-Wan likes about Qui-Gon’s letters. He likes to imagine Qui-Gon entering each letter of Obi-Wan’s name, a pattern of familiarity crafted over years. He enjoys the way Qui-Gon’s words go straight to the heart of things, but still contain layers of nuance that only someone who knows him can truly decipher.

Qui-Gon can say more with the placement of a single word than others can say in paragraphs.

Truth be told, Obi-Wan would be hard pressed to find something he _doesn’t_ like about Qui-Gon’s letters, unless you count the distance that makes them necessary.

But perhaps paradoxically, Obi-Wan’s favourite thing about Qui-Gon’s letters is finishing them. Because there, above the simple Basic characters of his name, Qui-Gon always concludes with a parting in Jiräse.

It isn’t Qui-Gon’s first language, if you count such things in terms of fluency; he had been raised on Coruscant from infancy. It was only as a student in the Jedi Order that Qui-Gon had begun learning the language his mother had spoken as she held him in her womb.

It is a language that suits him, somehow, careful and melodic and so full of subtlety that it could take a lifetime to truly learn. Obi-Wan has even heard him speak it before, though not often; mostly Qui-Gon brings it out on the occasional mission, or while caught in the world of dreams.

But once, when Obi-Wan was twenty-four, they had stood on the shores of Sana’ji and watched the water break against cliffs of shale.

“Ma¨råta¨i,” Qui-Gon had said quietly, his eyes caught on the horizon, while Obi-Wan stood at a loss for words.

Years later, when he learns the meaning layered into that brief phrase, Obi-Wan thinks of shale eroding away and _that which one wishes to hold always but disappears between one blink and the next_.

\---

_Obi-Wan,_

_You know I must disagree. I well recall your esteem for Tanomas Mirren, but I suspect that Kaz Shen-jo comes closer than anyone to articulating what Aiden describes as_ peace _._

_Take, for instance, the opening lines of her “Solitude”:_

_You have found  
me where I could  
not find myself.  
On broken shores  
of solitude  
you remake me of old  
anew._

_From experience, I doubt I have swayed you, so we must continue to hold our own opinions on this matter. Still, I will never dismiss an opportunity to expose you to Shen-jo’s lines._

_An¨åmë¨tai,  
Qui-Gon_

\---

There are hundreds of languages a Jedi initiate may choose to learn in the course of their studies. Obi-Wan is fluent in Twi’leki, and Shyriiwook, and Amani, and half a dozen others.

Jiräse is not one of them.

But it feels a little like cheating to ask Qui-Gon to translate his own words, so in the years after Naboo, Obi-Wan spends a great deal of time burying himself in various lexicons. It is a difficult language to render accurately, with ten consonants and twenty-five vowels that form a complex dance of syllables, but Obi-Wan has always preferred tasks that require delicacy.

Slowly, Qui-Gon’s words unfold before him.

 _Liä na ma¨ræ_. Be safe and well. _T¨arî liana_. My thoughts go with you. _An¨åmë¨tai_. Farewell for this moment. _Âri¨a ja¨maîe_. Swift returning. _Ma¨ae aër¨sò_. My best of hopes.

These words, and dozens of others, Obi-Wan folds into himself. He keeps a catalogue of them in his mind and pulls them out when the loneliness of space or duty or the demands of Jedi life threaten to close in around him.

Obi-Wan cannot see that Qui-Gon will ever gift him his heart. But Qui-Gon gifts him these words, and that is…

He cannot quite say _enough_ , but it is more than he can ask for, really.

\---

_Obi-Wan,_

_You grow more impertinent with every year. But it would be a lie to say it distresses me, so I shall not._

_I will admit that it is one of Mirren’s better verses; no more. You will have to work harder to convince me that his metre is more rhythmic than Shen-jo’s._

_I am relieved to hear that you are safely back from Parmai, and I am sorry that I will miss you before you embark for Kida. I should have liked to take you up on your offer of a meal. It has been far too long since I have enjoyed your company._

_I have been asked to witness a renewal of the Treaty of Seswa. I expect you will recall how little you liked that mission. Before you can instruct me so, I promise I will do my best to prevent another intergalactic incident. I still maintain that the first was not my fault._

_After all, they have asked me to return._

_Âri¨a ja¨maîe,  
Qui-Gon_

\---

When Obi-Wan is twenty-nine, he spends five long months on Kida. It is a small, pretty Mid Rim planet full of rolling hills and plains. He is there to help negotiate between opposing factions of a government ready to split in civil war.

It is a task no one expects to take more than a few weeks, but tensions spike when a string of violent tremors strike the capital city.

Before he knows it, Obi-Wan is left trying to preserve a half-wrought peace in the wake of a natural disaster.

It ends up being one of the most difficult assignments he has ever been given, physically and emotionally taxing in a way that feels something like drowning. Every time he thinks they’re making headway, something else happens to pull him under.

But he’s on Kida when he learns that he isn’t the translator he thought he was, so he remembers it fondly nonetheless.

(Perhaps _fondly_ is too strong a word; but he does not begrudge it, at least.)

\---

_Obi-Wan,_

_I am more relieved than I can say that you have come through the earthquakes unscathed; but I am sorry to hear that your work goes so painfully on Kida. If there is anyone up to the task, I know it is you, who has_

_the strength of  
ten thousand suns  
in your heart.  
no less,  
but I will not  
say no more._

_You see, I do read Mirren from time to time._

_Ma¨ae aër¨sò.  
Qui-Gon_

\---

Kida is something of a metropolis, with a shifting population drawn from dozens of other planetary systems. Obi-Wan doesn’t believe in chance overly much, though of course he believes in the Force. But by chance—by the Force—his host is from Jirä.

Ylenia is one of the neutral magistrates who had requested a Jedi negotiator in the first place. She is calm and warm and collected, and she teaches him more Jiräse in those five months than he has ever managed to learn on his own. It is a lifeboat, of sorts—one that helps him keep afloat in the time between Qui-Gon’s letters.

When the treaty is finally sealed and he can return to Coruscant, Obi-Wan wants to thank her, somehow, for the gift she has given him. No words in Basic seem to be enough, so when Ylenia and her family escort him to the shipyard, he gives her words he keeps closer to his heart, words of friendship and health.

The words feel awkward on his tongue in a way they don’t when he sounds them out in solitude.

Ylenia blinks at him in surprise, and Obi-Wan immediately knows that he’s misspoken. He feels his own brows draw together as he tries to puzzle out where, exactly, he has gone wrong.

These are words he has turned over in his mind more times than he can count.

“It is something a friend said to me, once,” he says carefully, and the Basic words feel strange in his mouth, too. “I wanted to wish you well.”

The light of understanding breaks across Ylenia’s face. “A friend,” she says, and Obi-Wan cannot fathom why she suddenly looks so amused. “This friend is from Jirä?”

Obi-Wan nods in response, and Ylenia presses a hand against her sudden smile.

“I apologize if I have spoken in error.” He feels hyper-alert in the face of his own confusion—sharply aware of the stones beneath his boots, and the rising blur of the sun, and the fading warmth of autumn air that stirs Ylenia’s dark hair.

“Not in error, precisely, but…liä na ma¨ræ.” She turns the syllables over slowly, carefully. “It is somewhat more than a wish for health.”

It is not Obi-Wan’s pronunciation, then. Consternation rises further in his chest at the thought that he has misread Qui-Gon and his words. A part of him, deep down, doesn’t want to know what they actually say, doesn’t want this taken from him. But Ylenia has said _something more_ and not _something less_ , and Obi-Wan very suddenly needs to know what he has apparently been missing for years.

“What more?”

“It is a benediction,” Ylenia says with a mischievous twinkle to her eyes, “that one gives to someone who is precious beyond price.” Her eyes flick to her wife, Sarela, who is standing a few feet away, and it is suddenly as if every piece in the puzzle of Obi-Wan’s life snaps into place.

Some realizations come slowly, like the gentle creep of an eclipse. This one is more like the waves on the cliffs of Sana’ji.

It breaks with a force that consumes.

Qui-Gon’s words have not been partings, not really. They have been declarations, revelations, _confessions_ , made in such a way as to give Obi-Wan every opportunity for plausible deniability should he need it.

He might have wished that Qui-Gon had not been so subtle, but it is hard to wish for anything when a whole world is opening before you.

“A¨raía na ma¨ra,” Ylenia says gentle, and her words bring him suddenly back to the here and now. She translates before turning to go. “Safety to you always, my friend.”

“Wait.” The word comes out in a rush, and Ylenia stops and turns to look at him in question. “What do I say to him in return?”

“To your friend?” She tilts her head slightly in curiosity, and he can see that she is fighting back another smile. “I think only you can determine that.”

He might have flushed, were he younger or less distracted. “No, I meant…” he cuts to a stop, tries to order his thoughts. “How do I tell him I understand? That I feel the same way?”

She has stopped trying to hide her smiles, but Obi-Wan could not care less if he looks and sounds like a fool. All he knows is that he has to do something with his newfound knowledge, that he intends to say something the very next time he sees Qui-Gon alone, and it would feel wrong to say it in Basic.

“What is it, _precisely_ , that you wish to say?”

Obi-Wan doesn’t hesitate. “That he is everything. Everything I need to be safe and well.”

She walks him through the syllables, some of which are already familiar to Obi-Wan and some of which are not. She makes him say them again and again, and he dutifully obeys until her lips no longer grimace at his pronunciation.

“It is as close as you will get in so short a time,” she says ruefully. “But he will understand.” She touches his elbow briefly in good luck. “You will send word, I hope, of how this grand love story plays out.”

He says the words in his head as he climbs aboard his ship. He says them as he runs through flight preparations.

He says them again and again into the silence as he turns his ship towards home.

\---

_Obi-Wan,_

_Yes, I will be on Coruscant when you return._

_I will say again, as I have said these past five months—be well. I hope it is a quick and uneventful journey._

_Liä na ma¨ræ._

_Qui-Gon_

\---

Qui-Gon is, indeed, on Coruscant when he returns. He is, in fact, waiting for Obi-Wan’s ship—not off preparing for another mission, or engaged in Anakin’s training, or making a tangle of the Council’s lives.

He is there, in the flesh, and Obi-Wan will walk down the ramp and give him words that are spoken and not written, both more corporeal and less at the same time.

When he gives Qui-Gon the words that he has said again and again in his heart, even before Ylenia had carefully walked him through the syllables, Qui-Gon’s smile breaks like the dawn. He holds out one hand, palm up and curled in such a way that it will perfectly accept Obi-Wan’s own.

Obi-Wan needs no translation.

**Author's Note:**

> “All knowledge is worth having” is taken from Jacqueline Carey’s _Kushiel’s Dart_.
> 
> All facts about Qui-Gon's birth planet completely fictional.
> 
> I think this is the fluffiest fluff I have ever written. I literally took this as an excuse to have Qui-Gon send Obi-Wan poetry. I hope you enjoyed it, and thank you for reading!
> 
> I'm on tumblr at [treescape](https://treescape.tumblr.com/).


End file.
